


From Major to Minor

by Blake



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Canon Compliant, Couch Sex, Emotional, Established Relationship, Harry and Louis's tattoos, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mild Pain Kink, Non AU, Stick Poke tattoos, Tattoos
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-15
Updated: 2016-10-15
Packaged: 2018-08-22 11:44:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8284618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blake/pseuds/Blake
Summary: The origin of Harry and Louis's alleged half-heart stick poke tattoos, or, alternatively, I'm half a heart without you, or even more alternatively, I can feel your heart inside of mine.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I can't stop writing these sappy established relationship stories. I'm super new to the fandom so I hope they don't mess with canon too much. I hope you all like the story! I'd love to know if you do.  
> Thanks Hurdy Gurdy for the beta job.

Louis startles awake to a sharp, stabbing pain in his chest.

“The fuck?” he cries out, flailing to fend off his attacker before he even opens his eyes.

A heavy weight settles low on his stomach. “Stop it, Lou, you’ll hurt yourself,” Harry says, his voice tumbling effortlessly down, like autumn leaves taking their time sailing from the tree to the ground, almost as though withstanding Louis’s onslaught of slaps is costing him no effort at all.

Louis lets his hands settle on the hips that are presently straddling his stomach and opens his eyes to look up at the needle in Harry’s hand. It glints dramatically in the dim light. “I’ll hurt me _self_?!” he shrieks, his voice trapped high in his throat from grogginess. “So says the man impaling me with sharp objects in my sleep!” He looks down to his chest, where there’s a small little bead of black ink and blood starting to spill over. He looks up at Harry, whose face always breaks likes dawn when he’s working up something to say. Louis gives the sun a moment to rise and looks back at the pool of ink on his pectoral.

“No,” Harry finally says, “I impaled you _before_ you fell asleep.”

Louis rolls his eyes, because _that_ wasn’t really worth the wait. He shifts his hips under Harry’s, feeling the ache as his muscles shift, scrunching his nose at the discomfort. Harry keeps his hands up and to the side, as though suspecting Louis will make a grab for them, and leans his head down into Louis’s space. His hair falls from behind his ears, swaying, heavy with dried sweat, as he explains, “Because, traditionally, _technically_ , impaling means going through the—”

“Okay, okay, spare me the random torture facts that I don’t want to know where you learned, and tell me why you’re tattooing me in my sleep,” Louis huffs, trying to sound as affronted as possible. His chest is rising and falling rapidly, and he can feel himself sweating into the sofa upholstery, his body still panicked from the rude awakening.

Harry looks down at him with a familiar smirk. Louis spots the purple stain of wine on his lower lip and fights to stay afloat amongst the drowning thoughts of drawing that lip into his mouth, between his teeth. Harry seems to find something to satisfy his suspicion in Louis’s face because he lowers his hands down within Louis’s reach. Scraping the needle lightly across Louis’s sternum, he pouts and murmurs, “Because I didn’t think you’d let me if you were awake.”

Louis is stuck looking at Harry’s stained, pouting lip again. He catches his breath before he can scoff, “Harry, I let you put your monster cock in me just a few hours ago. You think I might be trusted to let you put a needle in as well?”

Harry lets his head drop onto Louis’s chest, presumably so he can watch more closely as he grazes Louis’s nipple with the needle. “S’only been _one_ hour,” Harry mumbles against his sternum. Louis gives himself a triple chin to look at the chaotic lines of loose ink Harry is smearing across his skin. He reaches up to push his hand across the curve of Harry’s bent spine, hoping to soothe him. Harry may be _acting_ silly, but Louis can feel how troubled he is in the heaviness of his usually air-light limbs.

“Couldn’t sleep?” Louis asks quietly. He’d been out cold nearly as soon as Harry finished inside him. He remembers feeling Harry slip out, remembers feeling come and lube leaking out onto the sofa, remembers thinking _oh, well_ and the oppressive warmth of Harry’s body curling up around his and pressing him into the cushions, remembers thinking that if Harry was content to fall asleep in a puddle of arsehole leakage, then he was, too. If he gets imaginative, he can gather some hazy memories of Harry’s warmth peeling away from his back, a wet cloth between his cheeks and across his stomach, dim clinking sounds coming from elsewhere in the house.

Instead of answering, Harry pokes the needle down into the skin right beside the first spot. It hurts—a lot. Louis flinches, but with Harry on top of him, there’s not very far to go. Harry pokes again. “I’ll take that as a _no_ ,” he announces to the crown of Harry’s head.

Suddenly, Harry sits up straight, using his free hand to push his hair back like some kind of disgustingly beautiful mermaid cresting out of the water. “It’s midnight,” Harry says darkly, avoiding looking at Louis in his haste to lean over and dip the needle into the small bowl of ink on the coffee table. Louis frowns at the coffee table. Harry must have moved it back. He could have sworn he kicked it over at some point during the night.

“ _Only midnight so I can’t sleep_? or _midnight already so I don’t want to_?” Louis asks, spreading his hands out on Harry’s bare thighs for extra support as Harry continues leaning precariously, dipping the needle around in the ink as if in a trance.

Harry’s lips part, and he finally tilts his head so that Louis can look into his shining, ache-deep green eyes. “Just don’t want to waste our last few hours.”

The atmosphere turns suddenly somber, so Louis doesn’t say anything in response. He just watches Harry finally decide that enough ink has soaked into the thread wrapped around the needle and center his weight back on top of Louis. He starts pricking repeatedly into Louis’s skin. Fighting back grunts of pain, Louis brushes his thumbs up under the hems of Harry’s organic cotton boxers and strokes the devastatingly soft skin there.

Harry speaks again, wiping away excess ink with his fingers. “Want you to think of me while we’re apart.”

On instinct, Louis laughs at that. “Don’t need any help with that, love,” he says softly. It’s the simple truth. He’s not very good at _not_ thinking about Harry, no matter how many miles apart they are or how unforgivably badly Harry has hurt his feelings or how much less painful it would be to focus on something else. Louis knows. He’s tried. And he’s learned to stop trying.

“It’s ten whole _days_ ,” Harry whines, as if for the first time that night. He leans over the coffee table again, this time stopping to sip from the wine glass that’s standing right beside his little tattoo set-up. Louis takes the moment to look up and down Harry’s lean torso, in awe, forever in awe, of the man Harry turned out to be, sculpted under the shape of Louis’s hands since adolescence. How could something he touched turn out so _good_?

“We’ve done longer,” Louis says, which he has also said several times throughout the night. What typically happens next is that Harry reminds him that ten days is longer than they’ve been apart since the really good streak they’ve been having began. Since reconciling, since recommitting, since things started feeling _easy_ again.

This time, Harry turns back to Louis with a paper towel in the hand that isn’t holding the needle. He wipes up a bit, then sets in on applying a rapid series of shallow pricks. Louis feels the pain in his nipple even though (he looks down to confirm, and yes) the needle is nowhere near it.

He tries to put all of his accumulated pain into one single, “ _Ouch_.”

He’s pleased to see a watery smile beneath Harry’s furrowed brows. “ _That’s_ why I’m making you go first. You’d never let me if you had time to think about it.”

“ _Ah_ ,” Louis hisses, having trouble holding back now that he’s let go a little. “Go _first_? Meaning you’re second?”

Harry nods, lifting his eyes to smile warmly up at him. If Louis didn’t have years of practice behind him, he might have a little more trouble keeping up with Harry’s fluctuating emotional state. The wine is a helpful clue, as well.

“What’m I meant to do? A smiley face? I reckon I can do a smiley face,” Louis says through clenched teeth. He feels his own lips curl into a smile when he sees Harry’s grow.

“No,” Harry sighs, sitting up to wipe clean the new series of dots. “Just the same thing.”

He goes to refill the needle once again, and Louis looks down at his own skin, realizing for the first time that he has no idea what Harry is carving permanently into his skin. All he can make out is a curved line of raised skin and swollen pores, the ink barely visible. “Is it your cock?”

The way Harry’s abdominal muscles go lax and then tighten again as he laughs breathily is sensual in a way that makes Louis suddenly aware of his own nudity. “Just can’t get enough of it, can you?” Harry asks, his voice loose with mock curiosity and wonder.

Louis is quick to reply, “No, I definitely can,” slightly panicked at the prospect of having more of Harry than he’s already had tonight. His ass clenches instinctively against the corded upholstery. “Haven’t you heard of too much of a good thing?” he tacks on, even though they both know very well that Louis is the type to keep on eating ice cream even after his stomach starts to ache. Harry spares him a glance and a smirk before bending to his work again. Louis could swear it hurts more each time he starts up again.

When Harry returns to the coffee table and his wine glass, Louis pipes up, “Oi, the least you could do is _share_.”

With the rim pressing his lower lip flat in a way that makes Louis particularly thirsty, Harry advises, “It makes you bleed more,” like some kind of proper tattoo artist or something.

Louis raises his eyebrows as high as they can go. “So does getting tattooed by my half-drunk boyfriend,” he points out, but Harry is already bringing the glass over, sliding his hand under the back of Louis’s skull to tilt his head up off the sofa.

Louis keeps his eyebrows raised while he takes the offered drink.

It’s time, not the scant amount of alcohol, that makes his endorphins finally settle down a few minutes later. Louis gets into a sort of rhythm of breathing, tilting his head every so often to examine Harry’s progress, tilting his hips once in awhile to bring some circulation back into his legs.

Just when Louis becomes relaxed enough to close his eyes, Harry gets up to refill his wine glass. Louis watches his back in retreat, and his throat closes up at the thought that he’ll go ten days without being able to slide his hand down those sleek muscles. Once Harry’s in the kitchen, Louis lifts up and drags his body backward so that his neck and shoulders are propped up on the arm rest. He lifts his right hand, then remembers where that hand has _been_ and thinks better of it, bringing his left hand to trace over the design on his chest. The pattern of dots is more of a constellation so far, neither thick nor straight enough to be lines, but Louis can make out the shape of a broken half of a heart. He might not have recognized it if broken halves of hearts weren’t something that Harry regularly doodled onto his notebooks, Louis’s skin, whatever’s available.

When Harry returns with a glass _and_ a bottle of red, he settles into a new position, laid flat across the lower portion of Louis’s body to get back to work.

Louis spreads his legs, just enough to stick his cold toes beneath Harry’s thighs, and tries to breathe.

By the time Harry fills in his lines a few times over, Louis has dug himself into a pit of despair, imagining spending the next night alone and half a world away from Harry. His eyes start to sting when he pictures Harry curled up to sleep with his back exposed to the night air, no one to press against it. He’s being dramatic, he knows, but so is the only other person in the room right now, so there’s no one to check him.

He practically squawks in pain when Harry lowers his mouth onto the flaming hot tattoo-wound on Louis’s chest, latching on with his lips and swirling his tongue all around it. “I don’t think wine-spit counts as alcohol sterilization,” he says reedily, his eyes starting to spill over from the overwhelm of so much sensation, of how much Harry fucking loves him.

They kiss as they switch positions, Harry sitting up properly against the back of the sofa with Louis straddling his lap. The kiss tastes faintly of blood, and wine, and other things that don’t matter when you’re so madly in love you feel like half of a whole.

Before wiping down the area to be tattooed, Louis bends to kiss all over Harry’s chest. He can’t get enough of licking Harry’s skin, not ever, feeling the slide of every hair against his tongue, gathering skin with the suction of his lips. He bites gently down on one of Harry’s puffy, dark nipples, then licks so hard he can feel the shift of muscle over bone.

With a very slight tug to his hair, Harry cuts him off before he can get to the other side. Louis gets back on task, setting the ink precariously on the sofa’s rounded arm and cleaning the area Harry points to. He tucks his knees into the crevice between the back and seat cushions, props his heels up on flexed feet, and squats his bum just above Harry’s narrow thighs, careful not to stretch or strain too much. Loading the needle with ink, he smiles at the predictable touch as Harry reaches with both hands to palm over his hanging junk and pubic hair.

Louis chooses simply to ignore those teasing hands and brings the needle to Harry’s chest. He pokes shallowly into the skin and pulls out, feeling the slight catch as the sharp point exits. His breath hitches; Harry’s doesn’t.

Louis tries to copy the pattern that’s on his own chest, one poke at a time. Harry keeps petting and fondling him, and Louis lets him, biting back a smile. He always loves the pout that curves Harry’s lips when he doesn’t get the reaction he wants or when Louis can muster the control it takes to pretend indifference. Considering how completely shaky and fucked-out and _in pain_ Louis feels, a pout is just about all Harry’s soft stroking is going to induce out of anybody.

They talk of _that-time-when_ -s and _I-love-how-your_ -s and _did-you-know_ -s. They don’t talk of tomorrow.

At one point, with Harry’s hands finally settled down in a broad and light grip across Louis’s hips, Louis asks, “Don’t you think this is a bit obvious?”

“What, how hard I am in my pants right now?” Half of Harry’s mouth curves into a big smile as he says it, an ivory grin cutting into the molten gold of his cheek. Sometimes Louis feels sure the sun shines out from that smile. Harry Styles is the true center of the solar system, and everything else is just fairy tales.

“I meant _matching tattoos_ —”

“We’ve got other matching tattoos,” Harry says quietly and steadily, cutting him off as though he was calmly explaining something Louis _didn’t_ already know.

Louis hums in the back of his throat, enough grit in it to sound annoyed but not _actually_ annoyed. He repositions his hands on Harry’s chest and sticks the needle in a few times, his eyes on the things Harry’s hard prick is doing to his boxers. “They’re not _identical heart_ tattoos.”

“S’why we’re not in a public shop. People won’t even know.”

That hardly excuses the recklessness of it, and as little as Louis cares about _people_ knowing about them, he doesn’t fancy a few certain individuals finding out and getting them in trouble again. But conversations about Harry’s recklessness never go anywhere good, and besides, Louis’s the one with the guilty, blood-tipped needle in his hand. He keeps his smile in and the bite out of his voice when he says, “Oh, sure, that’ll work since you just _love_ buttoning your shirts up so high’s to cover this up.”

Harry’s hands slide around his hips to squeeze his cheeks. The stretch pulls at his hole and makes Louis squeak in pain. Harry laughs at him.

Pressing on as though the squeak never happened, Louis adds, “And you _love_ when I wear shirts that cover up my collar bones good and proper.”

“That’s right,” Harry says, in an absurdly contrary sort of voice. Not even waiting for Louis to remove his needle, he leans forward enough to put his lips on Louis’s clavicle. “All mine. No one else gets to see ‘em,” he murmurs against Louis’s skin, his lips sliding hot and messy as ever. Louis doesn’t point out that Harry expressed pretty much the exact opposite sentiment the last time Louis asked for help getting dressed in the morning.

Harry’s mouth suddenly gets _hotter_ and _messier_ as it drifts across his throat, then down to close over his sensitive _fresh tattoo_.

It becomes quite clear quite quickly that Harry has things on his mind other than getting tattooed. Louis’s arms are folded and trapped between their bodies, and he feels very small, seated on Harry’s lap and hardly taking up half the space. He rests his face in a nest of Harry’s hair and inhales from it for a few moments. Then he makes a push to break away, asking, “Let me finish, love?”

Harry licks one final scraping stripe over the wound and pulls back, nodding. His face is flushed pink and golden, a faint furrow in his brow as though he’s disappointed at letting himself get so carried away. That little furrow tugs deep and low in Louis’s stomach, an echo of the first fumbling times he got Harry off by shaming him for getting so hard so fast, a trace memory of Harry so young and so _his_ and so pliant in Louis’s desperate, hungry hands.

Louis lets that furrow sit there unsoothed, confident he would recognize the very instant Harry’s frustration might morph into sadness.

The half-heart doesn’t look as good as the one Harry did. Louis squints at it, trying to see what he can do to fill out the shape a bit better. He presses a single kiss to Harry’s lips and then starts poking.

Brought out of his stillness by the kiss, Harry moves one arm—the one Louis isn’t pinning down by the shoulder—to return to Louis’s cock, which certainly isn’t _un_ interested in what’s going on. Louis will never have it in him to remain neutral when Harry is involved, especially when Harry is mostly naked, or hard, or taking whatever Louis dishes out like he was born for it, or all of the above.

So Harry gets a pretty handful, but it’s not like Louis can come. It’s not so much a matter of recovery time as it is the issue of every single one of his muscles screaming at him never to do anything like _clenching_ or _grinding_ or _thrusting_ or even _bracing_ any time in the next century. Even holding himself squatting over Harry’s lap is a strain, his legs and back stiff and angry. He, unlike _some_ people, doesn’t get off on pain.

Then Harry’s hand slowly drifts further back, brushing pleasantly across other, generally happy bits. Louis only pays half attention but is fully aware of the touch all the same. He dips the needle in the ink, considering his options of what to do with Harry’s _state_. He could continue making Harry wait, but for how long, and after, does he want Harry in his hand, or should he drop to the floor between his knees, or would it feel too much like goodbye to finish him in bed, and do they have enough time for Louis to ruin him, really ruin him, the way he’s ruined Louis?

There’s pressure against his hole, and before Louis can catch his breath enough to express his outrage, Harry presses a dry fingertip up inside of him.

A wordless sound of protest comes out on Louis’s next breath as he slides his free hand into Harry’s hair and pulls. Just as he wanted, Harry looks up at him obediently, his eyes glassy and intent.

Louis swallows in preparation to say something, but Harry is already moaning, “You’re still so open from me,” and his pupils fucking blow wider as the words spill out of his mouth, and his breath is warm on Louis’s lips, and Louis is several years too late to be anything but a goner. Harry’s finger curls just a touch deeper and feels around, driving shards of pain down the nerves of Louis’s legs. Harry’s eyelids tremble shut, and he breathes out, “And wet.”

Louis would beg to differ, but Harry’s appraisal stokes the fire burning low in his belly and chars the words stuck in his throat.

“Can I?” Harry asks vaguely, already stroking his way further up Louis’s raw, swollen walls. Louis fights to keep his body relaxed and simply let the intrusion happen. He glances down at the fat wet spot spreading at the obscenely propped-open fly of Harry’s boxers—he can _smell_ him from this distance—and suddenly his saliva is flowing freely again.

“Can you what?” Louis’s voice comes out thin and weak.

Harry’s reply gushes out instantaneously on a breath. “Can I, please?”

It takes Louis a moment to process because it’s not the answer he was seeking. But Harry’s lashes fluttering against his cheek, his tongue peeking out to wet his pink lips, the absolute supplication in his deep voice: these things more than make up for the lack of information.

Louis musters up a dramatic shrug, sure that Harry is attuned to his body enough to recognize the motion without opening his eyes. “Suit yourself,” he says, trying to sound as magnanimously indifferent as possible.

Harry eagerly fucks his long finger all the way up. Louis grits his teeth against the overwhelm and pokes the needle into Harry’s tattoo a few times before realizing he’s not getting any ink in. Carefully, he moves to refill the needle, terribly aware of the metal ring on Harry’s knuckle, just shy of pushing past his puffy, used rim.

“Feel so fucking incredible,” Harry tells him, his green eyes flashing open and shining in the lamplight.

Instinctually, Louis clenches down around the finger and instantly regrets it as everything below his navel locks up. He bites his tongue until his body relaxes. “So did you— _several hours ago_ ,” he hisses pointedly, the but _not right now_ going unspoken. He presses the needle unnecessarily deep into Harry’s skin and tries to put the nonchalance back in his own expression.

But Harry keeps telling him what he feels like, keeps stroking gently up and down his just-slick-enough insides, keeps making these little gasping sounds like Louis’s arse around his fingers is painful to _him_ , and there’s really nothing in the world like being wanted like that. Maybe the second glass of wine is getting to Louis’s head, but he’s starting to feel a bit drunk on how helpless Harry is for him.

Louis has never understood this, but it somehow gets _easier_ when Harry slides a second finger in alongside the first. He manages not to grind down onto the sweet fullness, focusing instead on the pleasant cradle of Harry’s palm against his sac.

It goes on slow and steady. Louis is impressed by Harry’s patience; he seems to be satisfying himself by aimlessly feeling Louis up from the inside out. Even if Louis is half-hard from the filth bubbling out of Harry’s mouth and the dirty fullness that isn’t _constantly_ painful, it’s probably best that Harry finds his satisfaction in just feeling him like this. Louis wonders how long it would take for Harry to just spontaneously come in his pants. With a slight pang of regret, he thinks how different the possibilities might be if he hadn’t been so demanding earlier in the night. Maybe his muscles would move more freely if he hadn’t refused to separate long enough to move from the sofa to the bedroom. Maybe his arse wouldn’t be stinging and feeling broken if he hadn’t pushed Harry for _more, I’m ready_ and _harder, I can take it, gimme._

Harry’s not the only one with a reckless streak.

He kisses Harry leisurely, slowing down Harry’s frantic bites and desperate tongue-fucks with the grip in his hair. The needle hangs abandoned between his other fingers like a cigarette. Louis finds he doesn’t care how numb his legs are, doesn’t care if this goes on for the rest of eternity.

Then Harry, who has done a very nice and obvious job of avoiding Louis’s prostate, shoves his fingers right up under it in a firm little press, just hard enough to remind Louis of exactly what it would feel like. Louis backs out of their kiss to flash a warning glare at Harry, a _you can’t be serious_ look.

But Harry looks very seriously back at him and rubs his fingertips right over that spot and, a second later, digs in deep.

Louis drops the needle in his haste to clutch the arm of the sofa and incidentally knocks over the ink as well. He only barely notices, though, more focused on the fiery, nervy sensation of Harry massaging his prostate with his long, traitorous fingers. Louis’s breath comes up short, over and over again, sounding more like hiccups than anything else. He clutches Harry’s broad shoulders with both hands and stares into his eyes, struck by a sort of wonder that feels like betrayal, or maybe it’s betrayal that feels like wonder.

Harry must take this all as encouragement because he just drives in harder and harder. The wet sound of his arse, still slick,, opening up around those searching fingers makes Louis’s face fever-hot, or else it’s the expression on Harry’s face that’s making him flush: the wide, panting mouth, the bright flare in his eyes, like he’s giving birth to creation or meeting god. Louis’s heart thrashes so hard it gets caught in his throat.

It feels absolutely mad, but before Louis can even begin to process his overstimulation, he feels come start to dribble out of the tip of his cock, still only half-hard.

Harry’s there in an instant, a flurry of movement as he wraps his free hand around Louis’s shaft and thumbs the foreskin back so that Louis is dripping freely out onto Harry’s erection, which has finally sprung free of his boxers. Louis’s groan comes out in punches, in rhythm with Harry’s fingers pressing relentless and deep inside of him. He lets his head fall, his brow resting on Harry’s so they can both look down, crying out in unison as Harry paints his own cock with Louis’s come.

Louis might actually die.

He only realizes how white his vision has gone when he starts to see in color again. Now that the pounding of Harry’s fingers has slowed to something leisurely, he hears their voices moaning in unison and realizes it’s because Harry is smearing the small load all over himself, up the underside of his cock and across the already wet, swollen head.

Harry looks abruptly up at him, his eyes seeking permission. Louis knows that he’s too wiped out to answer anything but yes to whatever the question is, so he doesn’t even try. The next thing he knows, Harry is kissing him, and then he kind of loses track of limbs and gravity and where his skin starts and Harry’s ends.

When Harry stops kissing him, Louis is stretched out on his stomach, laid out flat across the sofa. He doesn’t catch on to where Harry is until he feels his hole being stretched open again by the very recognizable head of Harry’s cock.

Louis lifts his face off the cushion just enough to choke out, “Just what kind of girl do you think I am?” which doesn’t even make much sense once he’s said it, but his head is so heavy, he lets it fall again. He flutters his hole, which is apparently more resilient than he ever gives it credit for, around the gentle kiss of Harry’s prick. He’s rewarded by Harry crying out in what sounds like pain but is more likely pleasure.

“You can just put it in,” Louis adds helpfully, feeling so high on endorphins that he can’t feel the stretch of his arse, so it would probably be fine. The puddle of drool gathering under his cheek draws his attention to his own dopey smile.

But Harry doesn’t take him up on the offer. He just kind of holds himself there, the point where he’s thickest caught by the point where Louis is tightest. He lowers himself to one elbow, and Louis mouths over the bones of his wrist, which is close enough to reach. He can feel Harry’s other hand moving, stroking his shaft and every so often nudging against Louis’s bum, but for the most part, Harry is a vague blanket of warmth hovering over him until he starts to come, spurts of it slicking Louis’s insides _again_ , and that’s when Louis realizes, their new tattoos are aligned like this, one stacked atop the other, two halves to make a whole.

Harry pulls out only to land heavily on top of him, his face not far from Louis’s. He smells so strongly of _Harry_ , and Louis takes a big drag of it, savoring the sweat-skin-spit scent that always smells like home. They lie there until Louis starts to feel the sting of come where he’s been stretched too far and the scrape of upholstery against his latest tattoo and his overstimulated cock. Harry rolls over onto his side, freeing Louis’s lax face and ribcage to be a little bet less smushed into the couch so he can get a good breath of oxygen in. Louis lifts a lazy arm over Harry’s back and draws him close so he can nuzzle in and breathe from Harry’s neck again, without doing any of the moving.

Their legs are tangled together, and their breathing slows down in unison. Harry’s eyes are closed, but he isn’t sleeping. Louis says, “I hope you’re satisfied; you’ll be on my mind for at least the next couple of days, every time I sit, or stand, or lie down, or kneel, or twist, or—”

Harry sucks in a breath and lets it out saying, “I’m satisfied.” His mouth is smiling, but there’s a furrow in his brow, and it’s the sad kind of furrow.

“Oh, really?” Louis jokes, snaking his hand between them to lightly squeeze the base of Harry’s cock. “Don’t fancy another round, then?”

The dark cloud over Harry’s expression clears under the sunshine of his smile as he flinches away. “I always want another round, with you,” he says earnestly. His eyes are still shut, but Louis can imagine how maudlin they would look if they were open.

But unlike _some_ people, Louis has mercy and lets Harry’s cock settle back down onto Louis’s inner thigh. His hand takes the scenic route back up, grazing over Harry’s stomach, side, arm, shoulder, and ribcage. He gets to the new tattoo and looks it over as best as he can in the poor lighting with sticky contact lenses. He blinks a few times and notices several places that could have been filled in better.

“Is it good enough?” he finally asks.

Harry’s eyes blink slowly open. He tilts his chin to look down at where Louis’s hand is framing the half-heart shape. After only a moment, he looks up at Louis again with tears making emeralds of his irises. “It’s perfect; I love it,” he murmurs, and Louis feels once again in awe at how many things he can do right.

Louis leans in to kiss the tears from the corners of Harry’s eyes. When his mouth meets Harry’s, the kiss tastes like salt and blood and wine and home.

There’s a damp puddle of ink in the sofa cushion that Louis can feel under his ankle, and there’s a shower in the next room with his name on it, and there’s probably an alarm set somewhere in the house for five in the morning, but there’s a dull ache in his chest that’s soothed only by the slide of Harry’s lips under his.


End file.
